Do you see what i see?

"A rose by any other name might smell as sweet, but one called by any other color might look a bit different."

"Roses are red; violets are blue. But if we called a violet red, what color would it be? This is not a rhetorical question. How we label things can affect how we perceive them. Naming can impose meaning. And though science and anthropology have provided significant support for the proposition that color perception is basically identical across societies, recent studies have found evidence that we also see our rainbows through cultural lenses."
COLOR COGNITION
NYTimes Magazine

Digressions: This has been a favorite of mine -- I see blue and you see blue -- but who is to say we both perceive that color the same way? Or, for that matter, shapes? It's one of those ideas that actually frighten me (because I need to know the answers), like the size of the universe. How can something be infinite? I can't grasp the concept with my limited developed brain matter.

It is not enough just to know -- I have to understand.

Black Friday, Saturday Edition

ORANGE CITY, Fla. (AP) -- "A mob of shoppers rushing for a sale on DVD players trampled the first woman in line and knocked her unconscious as they scrambled for the shelves at a Wal-Mart Supercenter."

Fla. Woman Knocked Out in Shopping Rush
"Paramedics called to the store found VanLester unconscious on top of a DVD player, surrounded by shoppers seemingly oblivious to her"

Black Friday

"While the most coveted trophies may change from year to year, the ritual does not. During the past century, America has transformed itself into a shopping nation."

Today is the day people in the retail industry refer to as BLACK FRIDAY - the day Americans as a group get out of the house and go shopping - and bringing profits back into the 'black'.
This is the ritual that, while it might have grown into more of a myth, indentifies the nation and let Americans create an identity that they feel comfortable with.

"Low prices reflect democracy. Brand names represent our search for a better life. And designer boutiques embody the promise of an ever-improving self. Yet Americans have made a Faustian deal with the culture of shopping, and especially with bargain culture. The retail prices may be low, but the social costs are high."
NYTimes Op-Ed: We Are Where We Shop

to my favorite all american boy

sometimes i post on subjects that have absolutely no relation to you, personally.

hard to believe it. i know.


happy thank-you-giving.

Thanksgiving, the holiday

What's supposed to be a raucous, bawdy meal celebrating all that's great about America (invading other countries, killing Indians) has become an Edith Wharton parody. [ MemeFirst ]

Via The NYTimes you learn How to Set the Table, and Why. [The Short Course]

Manners International (!) makes it easier on Americans by providing a table setting animation.

and for the 'official' version of why the US eat turkey: The Thanksgiving Story

Meanwhile, In a paralel universe...

in a Brasil I never left, this could be me, at my Father's Coffee Farm in Minas Gerais...

Carlos Roberto picking coffee beans
at the Fazenda da Lagoa farm
in the central state of Minas Gerais in Brazil.

NYTimes: Difficult Times for Coffee Industry as Demand Falls

"Coffee is the world's second most widely traded commodity after oil and provides jobs for millions in some of the world's poorest countries."

For those EBTG fans interested

BEN WATT :: US DJ DATES
Nov 27 :: New York :: US
Buzzin' Fly Thanksgiving Party
The Bowery Ballroom
6 Delancey St, NYC
Live PA :: Aswan (Automagic/Buzzin' Fly)
Visuals and Motion Graphics :: Willie Mack
Doors 22h00
$25

I heart/not-heart Christopher Street

Disclosure: I actually LIVE on Christopher Street. And its a love/hate relationship...

Christopher Street (excerpts)
© Betty Comden and Adolph Green, music by Leonard Bernstein
from WONDERFUL TOWN

HERE YOU SEE CHRISTOPHER STREET, TYPICAL SPOT IN GREENWICH VILLAGE.

AIN’T IT QUAINT,
AIN’T IT SWEET,
PLEASANT AND PEACEFUL ON CHRISTOPHER STREET?

HERE IS HOME, CHRISTOPHER STREET, RIGHT IN THE HEART OF GREENWICH VILLAGE.

LIFE IS CALM,
LIFE IS SWEET,
PLEASANT AND PEACEFUL ON CHRISTOPHER STREET.

(...)

LIFE IS GAY,
LIFE IS SWEET,
INTERESTING PEOPLE ON CHRISTOPHER STREET.

SUCH INTERESTING PEOPLE LIVE ON CHRISTOPHER STREET!

LOOK! LOOK!
POETS! ACTORS! DANCERS! WRITERS!

HERE WE LIVE,
HERE WE LOVE.
THIS IS THE PLACE FOR SELF-EXPRESSION.

LIFE IS MAD,
LIFE IS SWEET.
GREENWICH VILLAGE! GREENWICH VILLAGE! WHEEEE!!

SUCH INTERESTING PEOPLE LIVE ON CHRISTOPHER STREET!

HERE WE LIVE,
HERE WE LOVE.
THIS IS THE PLACE FOR SELF-EXPRESSION.

LIFE IS MAD,
LIFE IS SWEET.

INTERESTING PEOPLE LIVING ON CHRISTOPHER STREET!

my favorite musical

not a Brodway Queen. (not that...)

Wonderful Town
In 1940 the comedy My Sister Eileen was produced on Broadway. Written by Joseph Fields and Jerome Chodorov, it was based on the autobiographical stories of Ruth McKenney published in The New Yorker magazine in the 1930s. The plot revolved around two sisters, Ruth and Eileen Sherwood, hoping to find a place for their talents in New York City. In 1942 the play was made into a film also called My Sister Eileen, starring Rosalind Russell. Several musical versions of the play were discussed and worked on until the rights were acquired by Robert Fryer. Fryer took it to director George Abbot. Fields and Chodorov adapted their play into a libretto and Leroy Anderson and Arnold Horwitt wrote the score. However the score did not please Fryer, the playwrights or Rosalind Russell, who had agreed to star in her first Broadway musical (at age forty one). Five weeks before rehearsals were due to begin, Abbot asked Bernstein to bolster the score with some numbers. He declined but offered to compose a new score in conjunction with Adolph Green and Betty Comden. Abott agreed and when Jerome Robbins came on board it became a reunion for those who had worked on On the Town. Wonderful Town had rave out of town tryout reviews and hit New York City's Winter Garden Theatre on February 25th 1953. Broadway critics raved calling it the best musical since Guys and Dolls. Russell also received the best print of her career.

Wonderful Town 2003
NYTimes Theater Review:
"This "Wonderful Town" captivates in ways achieved by no other new production this fall. For one thing, there's something irresistible about the show's starry-eyed vision of New York. It's the most lighthearted of Bernstein's three big Manhattan musicals (the others are "On the Town" and "West Side Story"), and it artfully melds urban jitters and jive ("Swing," "Conquering New York") with a wistful, melodic romanticism ("Ohio," "A Little Bit in Love").

Betty Comden and Adolph Green's lyrics percolate with the show-off spunk you associate with being brash, bright and eager to impress. The wisecracking book by Joseph Fields and Jerome Chodorov (based on their play "My Sister Eileen," which was adapted from stories by Ruth McKenney and filmed with Russell in 1942) bubbles with both vintage wit and a callow optimism.

Some of the references (Major Bowes, anyone?) fly over the heads of contemporary audiences. But there's nothing stale about the show's giddy infatuation with a city. As the more wryly affectionate new musical "Avenue Q" demonstrates, the young and ambitious are still willing to rough it for a chance at success in New York City.
Manhattan has never looked as innocent as it does in "Wonderful Town," a show in which even hookers and muggers are cute. But it's the gaze of undiluted love that makes it appear that way."

One Hundred Easy Ways to Lose a Man: another favorite song from the show

NOW THE FIRST WAY TO LOSE A MAN --

YOU’VE MET A CHARMING FELLOW AND YOU’RE OUT FOR A SPIN.
THE MOTOR FAILS AND HE JUST WEARS A HELPLESS GRIN,
DON’T BAT YOUR EYES AND SAY, “WHAT A ROMANTIC SPOT WE’RE IN.”

Just get out, crawl under the car, tell him it’s the gasket and fix it in two seconds flat with a bobby pin.

THAT’S A GOOD WAY TO LOSE A MAN.

HE TAKES YOU TO A BASEBALL GAME,
YOU SIT KNEE TO KNEE.
HE SAYS, “THE NEXT MAN UP AT BAT WILL BUNT, YOU’LL SEE.”
DON’T SAY, “OOOH, WHAT’S A BUNT? THIS GAME’S TOO HARD FOR LITTLE ME.”

Just say, “Bunt? Are you nuts?!! With no outs, two men on base, and a left-handed batter coming up, you’ll walk right into a triple play just like it happened in the fifth game of the World Series in 1923.”

THAT’S A SURE WAY TO LOSE A MAN.

A SURE SURE SURE SURE WAY TO LOSE A MAN,
A SPLENDID WAY TO LOSE A MAN.

JUST THROW YOUR KNOWLEDGE IN HIS FACE,
HE’LL NEVER TRY FOR SECOND BASE.
Ninety-eight ways to go.

THE THIRD WAY TO LOSE A MAN --
THE LIFE-GUARD AT THE BEACH THAT ALL THE GIRLIES ADORE
SWIMS BRAVELY OUT TO SAVE YOU THROUGH THE OCEAN’S ROAR,
DON’T SAY, “OH, THANKS, I WOULD HAVE DROWNED IN JUST ONE SECOND MORE.”

Just push his head under water and yell, “Last one in is a rotten egg” and race him back to shore!

THAT’S A SWELL WAY TO LOSE A MAN.

YOU’VE FOUND YOUR PERFECT MATE AND IT’S BEEN LOVE FROM THE START.
HE WHISPERS, “YOU’RE THE ONE TO WHO I GIVE MY HEART.”
DON’T SAY, “I LOVE YOU TOO, MY DEAR, LET’S NEVER NEVER PART.”

Just say, “I’m afraid you’ve made a grammatical error -- it’s not ‘To who I give my heart,’ it's ‘To whom I give my heart’ -- You see, with the use of the preposition ‘to,’ ‘who’ becomes the indirect object, making the use of ‘whom’ imperative which I can easily show you by drawing a simple chart” --

THAT’S A FINE WAY TO LOSE A MAN.

A FINE FINE FINE FINE WAY TO LOSE A MAN,
A DANDY WAY TO LOSE A MAN.

JUST BE MORE WELL-INFORMED THAN HE,
YOU’LL NEVER HEAR “O, PROMISE ME.”

JUST SHOW HIM WHERE HIS GRAMMAR ERRS,
THEN MARK YOUR TOWELS “HERS” AND “HERS.”

YES, GIRLS, YOU TOO CAN LOSE YOUR MAN,
IF YOU WILL USE RUTH SHERWOOD’S PLAN:
ONE HUNDRED EASY WAYS TO LOSE A MAN!

Gay Men, analyzed

"Gay men, presumedly being no less shallow than straight men, aren't likely to begin their mating rituals with the search for the inner man. It's much more 'nice bod, you'll do'."
via Financial Times

Rio de janeiro

by Claudio EdingerIpanema, Posto 9
The Gay Beach

"Rio looks like a person able to live all his or her incarnations at the same time: beautiful and vain, sophisticated and uncultured, generous and cruel, cosmopolitan and small-minded. For the span of one life and in one body, it connects the entire range of human possibilities, from the most diabolical to the divine."

Musarium: Rio by Claudio Edinger

Wayne Levin II

Fish and Swimmers
Ironman Triathalon
Kona, Hawaii

reading the sunday times on saturday

THIS WEEKEND'S THEME: GAY MARRIAGE

[1] untying the knot
Week in Review
The 'serious' stuff - back in that session of the paper few people know it exists
"As the courts deal with the issue of same-sex unions, they are reconsidering a fundamental question: What is marriage?"
:: For Better or Worse: Marriage's Stormy Future
:: What Partisans Embrace, Politicians Fear
:: Gay Couples Follow a Trail Blazed by Slaves
[2] Love in the Time of No Time
in the Magazine
Online dating -- Not really a 'gay marriage article' but it should have been
"The city is full of people we can't reach. We pass them on sidewalks, sit across from them in the subway and in restaurants; we glimpse their lighted windows from our own lighted windows late at night. That's in New York."
[3] The Power of Marriage
by DAVID BROOKS
It's an Op-Ed, you are entitled to your opinion, we do not have to agree with you...
"Even in this time of crisis, every human being in the United States has the chance to move from the path of contingency to the path of marital fidelity — except homosexuals."
"Anybody who has several sexual partners in a year is committing spiritual suicide. He or she is ripping the veil from all that is private and delicate in oneself, and pulverizing it in an assembly line of selfish sensations."
[4] For Gay Couples, New Rituals at the Altar
on Sunday Styles
I guess we DO have to consider that aspect... We do not want to be made fun of on Page Six.
"But what will this new-yet-old social ritual look like? Will same-sex couples be guided by Emily Post or will men walk down the aisle to 'Today I Met the Boy I'm Going to Marry,' as David Tutero and Ryan Jurica did last September?"
[5] How the other 0.1 percent flies.
Castles in the Sky: Gay Gay Gay!
[6] Winds of change
PICTURES OF THE TIMES: The Week of Nov. 13 to 20
Wind gusts of up to 50 m.p.h created leaf storms in downtown Brooklyn, making it difficult for pedestrians to cross the street.

El más Buenón

My friend Glenn (#4) is nominated for 'best overall package' (his own translation for 'el mas buenon') in a club down in Colombia.
I'm not joking and definitely not under the influence.

whatever turns you on

I have to agree with Mr. SH

My neck
My back
Lick my pussy and my crack

Khia: My Neck, My Back (Lick It)

This is some people's favorite song.
So dumb, yet it holds my attention.

FLOATING
Wayne Levin

right and wrong

Parent killer Menendez marries in Calif. prison

Elder brother exchanges vows with woman he’s known for 10 years

MSNBC: Lyle Menendez, who was convicted with his brother for the shotgun slayings of their parents, was married Thursday in a California prison.

"The second Menendez brother gets married in prison. No conjugal visits. Just a recognition that even parent-killers are human beings under the law. Menendez just got more rights in his relationship than all of the following:

Gloria Bailey, sixty years old, and Linda Davies, fifty-five years old, had been in a committed relationship for thirty years;
Maureen Brodoff, forty-nine years old, and Ellen Wade, fifty-two years old, had been in a committed relationship for twenty years and lived with their twelve year old daughter;
Hillary Goodridge, forty-four years old, and Julie Goodridge, forty-three years old, had been in a committed relationship for thirteen years and lived with their five year old daughter;
Gary Chalmers, thirty-five years old, and Richard Linnell, thirty-seven years old, had been in a committed relationship for thirteen years and lived with their eight year old daughter and Richard's mother;
Heidi Norton, thirty-six years old, and Gina Smith, thirty-six years old, had been in a committed relationship for eleven years and lived with their two sons, ages five years and one year.

And millions more."
via Andrew Sullivan

We're drowning in explanations.

What we need is more questions.
Shirley Hazzard a Winner at National Book Awards

one poem

I come from afar and bear in my profile,
If only in remote and misty form,
The profile of another being, at variance
With the base and human silhouette now mine.

Perhaps in former times I was, not Boabdil,
But merely his last look from the road
At the face of the Granada he was leaving,
A cold silhouette beneath the unbroken blue...

What I am now is that imperial longing
For what I once saw of myself in the distance...
I am myself the loss I suffered...

And on this road which leads to Otherness
Bloom in slender wayside glory
The sunflowers of the empire dead in me...

Stations of the Cross
by Fernando Pessoa

Pessoa (ps´wä), 1888–1935, Portuguese poet, b. Lisbon. Reflecting the influence of both the classical tradition and French symbolism, his poetry moves from saudosismo, or nostalgia for a mythic past, to an increasing concern with consciousness and sensation. He is famous for having written under 73 different names. Four of these (his own, Alberto Caeiro, Ricardo Reis, and Álvaro de Campos) are well known. Each of these personas has his own putative biography, physical characteristics, relationship to the others, poetic voice, and outlook, and in part reflects Pessoa’s disbelief in the idea of an integrated personality. Among Pessoa’s collections, which include poems in English, are Sonnets (1918), English Poems (1922), and Mensagem (1934).

Modernism and the Paradoxes of Authorship: 'He created a large gallery of authors, each with his own history, who also wrote essays commenting on one another—including Fernando Pessoa "himself."'

and another TWO POEMS

Eu amo tudo o que foi,
Tudo o que já não é,
A dor que já me não dói,
A antiga e errônea fé,
O ontem que dor deixou,
O que deixou alegria
Só porque foi, e voou
E hoje é já outro dia.

I am the escaped one,
After I was born
They locked me up inside me
But I left.
My soul seeks me,
Through hills and valley,
I hope my soul
Never finds me.

Fernando Pessoa

connections redux

"Hey there, thank you, that was very humbling, and very encouraging.
I'm glad you introduced yourself, it'll be great having a new blogger to check in on. Your friend DW wrote me as well, and you both had almost the same subject line in your e-mails. I heard from another blogger that day who said he had played this little game with himself where he pretended that he only had five minutes to take five books with him from his bookshelves, and Cavafy was on the list. I'm certainly inspired to read more of him now. That essay by Rachel Cohen was in the Best American Essays 2003 anthology, you might be interested in it since you like both poets."

Email from dogpoet
"I love house music, heat lightning, and warm nights, which are rare in San Francisco."

I CAN'T STAND THE RAIN

Against my window
Bringing back sweet memories
I can't stand the rain
Against my window
Cause he ain't here with me

Daydreams: Wish it were raining again today : (

Step 13: Attitude Adjustment

You realize your attitude isn't really attractive.
Some of your idealism starts to come back.
Only some of it though.
You also realize you're not getting any younger, so if you're going to do it, it had better be now.

Wonder Boy: The Gay Spiral

He's Bad! He's Dangerous! This is a Thriller! He's Off the Wall!

Gothamist: Requisite Michael Jackson Mugshot Post
Just when you thought you were tired of Michael Jackson, he becomes interesting again. Admit it – there could not be a more insane mugshot picture; he sort of looks like a comic book villain, like the Joker.

dogpoet, cavafy, pessoa & insights

Date: Thu, 20 Nov 2003 08:54:04 -0800
From: Mr. DW
Subject: dog poet talks "new york and cavafy"
mildly uncanny: dogpoet

As you get to know it more -- and better -- the world shrinks to a ridiculous size. You now already half-jokingly expect to have slept with the ex of the guy you will meet tonight.
But, beyond personal connections, referencing are getting less original...
So, this week, there were (at least three) people thinking about New York and Cavafy at the same time. Some of these people know each other. Some will never meet. It certainly gives you comfort that you are not the only lunatic out there.

where is my tribe? where are my people?

dogpoet was one of the very first blogs I read and it fascinated me by the directiveness of its good writing and insight.
And he just gave me a few new insights:
WHY I love Pessoa and Cavafy (Fernando Pessoa is my favorite poet in Portuguese, more on him to come)
WHY I chose Cavafy to speak for me this week.
WHY I want to keep alive the possible; the diverging paths that I choose to believe lie ahead.

"And then I remembered an essay I had read on the plane, Lost Cities by Rachel Cohen, who examined the lives of two poets, Fernando Pessoa and Constantine Cavafy, who were clerks during the day and who wrote in the evenings. And I opened the book and read this aloud:

'Many of the fragments begin with the mundane: the account books, Pessoa's boss Vasques, his occasionally foolish colleague Moreira, the delivery boy, the clock and the calendar on the wall. Then there is the feeling of the office when the sky outside darkens in a storm. Anxiety comes with the storm, a sense of menace, and Pessoa is glad for the company of the office, the joke of the delivery boy, the protection and comfort of this undemanding company. This is the shape of his world in the day and it frees him for the night. In the evening, he walks the streets of Lisbon and returns home to write perfect crystalline meditations on depression, insomnia, nostalgia, memory, the city?s geography, anonymity, and mortality. It seems that this work is possible only in his straitened conditions. The city wanderings must have their dusty contrast, must play in relief.'

I read to find those writers who have tried to make sense of their cities, their solitude; writers who have found, in a particular arrangement of words, a world worth describing. I read to recognize this shared endeavor, because by reading I feel less alone, here along the margins of my own making. And I read for the romantic notion of the poet and the clerk. And I read this aloud to my friend, because I wanted to offer something, some proof or evidence of a tradition; as though by reading it aloud we could belong to the shared history of writers. And I read it aloud because I wanted to keep alive the possible; the diverging paths that I choose to believe lie ahead. And I read it aloud to extend and inhabit this tradition; each of us tied to the other through words; from Cavafy and Pessoa to Rachel Cohen; her words tying my friend and I together to that city, on that cold night, the sound of the wind outside her window a comfort before bed."

message from kentucky

vster-

kentucky is not such a bad place (much better than arkansas if memory
serves me well). today when i arrived (as usual) i was taken with its
beauty... lots of trees, rolling pastures, horses EVERYWHERE.
it's a spectacular, clear, crisp fall day in the bluegrass state...

-dster

two messages from Mr. JJ, a new editor-at large

ONE:
Date: Wed, 19 Nov 2003 09:25:57 -0500
From: Mr. JJ

i asked Paul to play 'Milkshake' on sunday...

[Note: At the Eagle Beer Blast, my 'Deviant Cheers', where we are I am EVERY ALMOST EVERY Sunday from 8-11. The DJ is our friend PAUL FERRER (who just last sunday complained i had not mentioned him in this blog. Paul: this one doesn't count) and he plays great music - and apparently take requests (a no-no for 'full-of-themselves' 'DJ-as-God's in NYC), as i also had a request that night. And he obliged! (Alright, this is my blog and my opinion>]

and Mike went back out to the car to get HIS special mix which we'd
been listening to...
and then Paul mixed THAT version in...
and then Paul mixed a THIRD version in....

i told Mike: 'It's a very good thing we like this song, cuz it's been
on for about an hour'.

Mr. JJ

TWO:
Date: Wed, 19 Nov 2003 09:33:56 -0500
From:Mr. JJ

the pedant in me must correct the second line of your lyrics...
you have:
'and they're right, it's better than yours'
actual lyrics:

'and they're like: 'It's better than yours'

--just a service to you vast readership!
Mr. JJ

milkshake

DW&I heard the greatest dance mix on Sunday. No idea about the song, artist, remix. Only could remember the chorus, something like My Milkshake... Damn right, It's better than yours... DW did some research, I did some more and voila:


MTV.com: Kelis Turning Heads Again With Her Tasty 'Milkshake'
"She makes her formal return to the game December 9 with Tasty, her second album in the States. The first single, 'Milkshake,' is gaining a buzz on the streets and radio with its idiosyncratic funk and Kelis' sexy, euphemistic playground rap:

My Milkshake brings all the boys to the yard,
and they're like: 'It's better than yours'
Damn right, It's better than yours,
I can teach you, but I have to charge


Milkshake sample
Milkshake lyrics
Milkshake Video

STILL

The fish is talking!

EQUAL RIGHTS

(MARRIAGE IS A BONUS. AND INSTIGATOR)

NYTimes: High Court in Massachusetts Rules Gays Have Right to Marry
Jornal do Brasil: Massachusetts aprova união gay. Estado poderá ser o primeiro nos EUA a autorizar casamentos entre pessoas dos mesmo sexo
AndrewSullivan.com: "THANK GOD ALMIGHTY, WE ARE FREE AT LAST: In one state, gay people have become equal citizens under the law"
CNN.com: "Massachusetts court rules ban on gay marriage unconstitutional"
Gothamist: "Massachusetts, the oldest state, came up with the same ruling as Hawaii, the newest state"

Excerpt from the court's 4-to-3 opinion, written by Chief Justice Margaret Marshall.

We are mindful that our decision marks a change in the history of the marriage law. Marriage is a vital social institution.

The exclusive commitment of two individuals to each other
nurtures love and mutual support.

It brings stability to our society

For those who choose to marry, and for their children, marriage provides an abundance of legal, financial and social benefits. In return, it imposes weighty legal, financial, and social obligations.

The question before us is whether, consistent with the Massachusetts Constitution, the Commonwealth may deny the protections, benefits and obligations conferred by civil marriage to two individuals of the same sex who wish to marry. We conclude that it may not.

the Blogosphere

"Blogs are products of a seismic cultural shift that makes someone's hangover as newsworthy as the arrival of a Harry Potter novel."

It's a Little Too Cozy in the Blogosphere
via [washingtonpost.com]

The more blogs you read and the more often you read them, the more obvious it is: They've fallen in love with themselves, each other and the beauty of what they're creating. The cult of media celebrity hasn't been broken by the Internet's democratic tendencies; it's just found new enabling technology.

The problem's built into the medium itself.

Blogs are set up to be personal forums for someone's opinions. That's the point, the liberating thing about them. Bloggers don't have to get their copy past an editor, and they can sound off at any length -- no word limits in cyberspace.

They're products of a seismic cultural shift that makes someone's hangover as newsworthy as the arrival of a Harry Potter novel. The sassier the voice, the more successful the blog is likely to be. In a Google universe, success is defined by hits: the number of visits a Web page gets. The more blogs link to each other, the more hits they all get; enough hits and a cyberstar is born. (...)click here to go to the article

reconnecting

connexion.org messages

one
DW (blah@blah.blah) has asked to add you as a friend.
Please go to: http://www.connexion.org/viewinvitations.cfm and confirm whether you really are friends with D. You should accept this request if you recognize the name and email address of the individual above since others will rely on your judgment about D. If you do not recognize D, you should probably decline the request or investigate further.
Regards,
Connexion Webmaster

two
From: DW
Subject: 'you' can make the diff...
Sent: 11/17/2003 8:33 PM
Message:

notice... connexion is running a fall recruitment drive. you could single-handedly 'diversify' the population.

ever heard the expression 'fight within the belly of the beast'?

xod (just one letter from god)

another chapter is completed in this BOOK OF FRIENDSHIP.
THANK YOU! Glad we can disagree. Static that i have a friend who listens and also hears. And speaks his mind out.

I STAND CORRECTED
Today i had a message from connexion.org that mentioned 'voting - that great American Institution and its ONLY MOST IMPORTANT differencial from similar copycats.
I feel bad because since I am a legal resident but never opted to become a citizen, i was punished by not being allowed to vote. But they allow me to keep paying all taxes...

Extra Credit: "The folks at Connexion are very interested in helping you to vote. So, as a service, we can send you an email reminding you about upcoming elections and, for those states where we have the information, we can even tell you where to go on voting day."

freudian slip

Mr. DW is moving away. The final destination seems to be Portland, OR with a layover in Kentucky for some family time. I was in his apartment this morning to help with the movers who were supposed to show up at 9:30 am.(alright, we did the Eagle Beer Blast together for the last time - for now - and went to Limelight Avalon to dance his goodbyes - music is a strong association we have - From there to 9:30, it's a blur). But 9:30 they didn't. The job had been requested for December instead of November. Mr. DW blames the person who took the order. I see a pattern. Freudian slip or not, it was nice to have some extra DWTime. Of course I am going to miss him. I know it's not an easy decision for him, the new yorker he became so quickly, but I believe is the right one. It takes GUTS and MATURITY. Clarification: Mr. DW is, in fact, the person who invited me to Connexion and who i referred to as 'Friend' on my post about that site. It seems that in trying to keep it on a more generic level and remove the person from the point of view i was expressing (any negative comment i made has absolutely no reflection on my friend mr. dw.) i also 'downgraded' him in the process. Of good intentions the hell is full, my grandmother was fond of saying...

DEFINITION (Freudian slip) noun:   a slip-up that (according to Sigmund Freud) results from the operation of unconscious wishes or conflicts and can reveal unconscious processes in normal healthy individuals

PARIS, BURNt

Opinion @ The Wall Street Journal: La Grande Horizontale
"Even as Americans have rushed to post and watch Paris burning, they've been wondering if they should. Some sites shied away from linking for fear of copyright problems, others because it violated Paris's 'privacy.' Most bizarre were the comments of Pamela Anderson (who knows a thing or two about sex tapes). She said she'd watched the tape, though only 'by accident,' and went on to give it 'two thumbs up.'

I admit that I have difficulties taking seriously the Hilton camp's claim to privacy. The only reason anyone knows about this great-granddaughter of hotel magnate Conrad Hilton is that her life is devoted to the maniacal pursuit of attention. Paris is so good at getting herself into the press that even Topeka grandmothers have seen photos of Paris dancing on tables, Paris arriving at her birthday party, Paris standing, smiling, eating, drinking, dancing, laughing."

a story (fairy tale)

"Do you know what it means to come home to someone who loves you?
To come home to someone who feeds you and cares for you?
It means you're in the wrong house."

In poetry and music, love and youth may be inextricably linked. But Millie Umschweis and Arnold Spitz know better. Young love was theirs for the taking. But that was 56 years ago, when friends fixed up Ms. Umschweis, then just 17, and Mr. Spitz, 33, on a blind date.

"I remember exactly what he wore, exactly what he looked like," she recalled. "We had a wonderful time, and he was a perfect gentleman. And then he asked if he could kiss me good night. I said, `No! What did you do for me, buy me dinner?' No girl ever said this to him."

He was not dissuaded, and within two years they had become very close, though Ms. Umschweis knew by then that Mr. Spitz was unavailable: his wife was unwilling to agree to a timely end to their failed marriage. "I was in love with her," Mr. Spitz, now 89, said of Ms. Umschweis. "But I was in the midst of a divorce that I couldn't shake."

Ms. Umschweis, 73, said: "He released me. It was difficult — very, very much so for both of us. But life went on, and he married a wonderful lady, and I married a wonderful man, and we had wonderful children. And I never saw him again. Did I think of him? Of course."

Over the years, Mr. Spitz thought of her, too, when, on his way to Snapco, his fastener manufacturing company in Hillside, N.J., he passed Millie's, her dress shop in West Orange. Driving by, he would sometimes say to his son and daughter: "I knew that girl once. I used to take her out."

Each had, they agreed, happy family lives — until 11 years ago, when Ms. Umschweis's husband and one of her two sons died within 13 months of each other. A couple of years later, Mr. Spitz's second wife, whom he had married in 1955 after finally receiving a divorce from his first, fell ill with Alzheimer's disease. Eventually, she was moved into a nursing home, where he visited her every day until the end.

In September 2002, Ms. Umschweis was reading the obituaries in the newspaper and saw one about Mr. Spitz's wife. "I didn't know where he lived," she said, "but I looked for a phone number for his son, and I left a message on his machine. I said, `My name is Millie, and if I have the right party, please call me back. And please give your father my condolences. I know what it is to lose.' "

That night, Mr. Spitz returned home to find a note. It read simply, "Call Millie."

And so they spoke for the first time in more than a half-century and arranged to meet. "I think I went out with Arnold more out of curiosity," she said. "I wondered, Would he remember me?"

He did. "In fact, when she came into the car, I saw for a moment that she was 17 years old," he said.

She said: "I knew immediately we would be together. "I had lost half a family. I didn't want to lose any more. But I love him. And I felt that life is a gamble, and there are no guarantees."

The night before the wedding, Mr. Spitz, who still works six days a week, reflected on their timing.

"Love came a little late, but mature love perhaps is deeper and stronger," he said. "It's completely engulfing, a complete feeling of giving to each other what we can possibly give. It's very exciting."

Ms. Umschweis wore a pale mauve Chantilly lace gown at the ceremony last Sunday afternoon at the baronial red-brick clubhouse at the Maplewood Country Club in Maplewood, N.J., where 100 guests had gathered. The rabbi, Alfred Landsberg, found occasion to repeat a Henny Youngman joke about marriage: "Do you know what it means to come home to someone who loves you? To come home to someone who feeds you and cares for you? It means you're in the wrong house."

Asked about the logic of a union so late in life, the bride said: "We may have only a couple of years left together, but Arnold taught me that you have to live each day. As my mother, who is 95, said, `You're never too old to love. And the heart pounds the same at 17 as it does at 73.'"

Via NYTimes Vows: Millie Umschweis and Arnold Spitz

ART: John Currin

Thanksgiving
''The painting, a satiric riff on rituals both American and art-historical, at first looks like something painted by a 16th-century Flemish mannerist with a fondness for fair-skinned damsels and exaggeratedly long necks.

But then you realize that the picture is a comedy of American manners. It depicts three women gathered around a Thanksgiving table, one of them lovingly raising a spoon toward the gaping mouth of the woman in the middle. Despite the tender maternal gesture, dinner is likely to be most unsatisfying -- the massive turkey on the table remains uncooked and makes for the most horrific object, its rubbery, slightly bluish skin resting in a pool of runny blood. (Departing from his usual practices, Currin drew this scene from life, enlisting his wife as a model and purchasing a 25-pound turkey that ''smelled terrible after three days in my studio,'' he recalled.) It is certainly the most convincing turkey to appear in art since Norman Rockwell painted his ''Freedom From Want'' in 1943 and helped to establish Thanksgiving as the quintessential national holiday, celebrating neither religion nor ethnic identity but the singularly American devotion to enormous helpings of bland food.

"Currin's ''Thanksgiving'' can fairly be described as an early-21st-century masterpiece"

Currin, by contrast, brings us a Thanksgiving whose gothic excesses can make it seem more like Halloween. The roses on the table are wilting, and the glass vase holding them is half-filled with filmy water. In the lower right corner, a white dinner plate juts at an angle into the viewer's space -- you are invited to join the meal, but are offered only an empty plate.

The painting might be seen as a meditation on Yankee thrift and parsimony, which can leave people even in comfortable homes feeling deprived. Who among us doesn't wish, at times, that we were better fed and cared for? Such primal anxieties are mingled here with cultural ones: art is supposed to nourish us, but what if contemporary painting and its compulsive recycling of older styles offers nothing to feast on and in fact leaves us aesthetically starved?

Currin's ''Thanksgiving'' can fairly be described as an early-21st-century masterpiece, a word that has been so overused as to be almost meaningless. A masterpiece, by definition, is supposed to be a consummate example of some kind of skill, and there can be little doubt that this picture qualifies. It proves that virtuosity can be the source of emotionally raw art, a message that goes against the radicalism of the last century. The heroic legends of the avant-garde -- whether you take a dry conceptualist like Duchamp or a feverish expressionist like Pollock -- elevated sensibility over technical skill and unwittingly led a generation to believe that nothing could be more boring than a nicely drawn turkey."

Excerpt from Mr. Bodacious: NYTimes article on John Currin

PORN IS THE NEW BLACK

An Internet Music Video

The Music: "Michael Soldier has stepped up to the mic with biting camp swagger to deliver his cautionary tail on PORN IS THE NEW BLACK. This punky, funky, rock-n-roll soundtrack single was written and performed by members of Soldier's band PEPPERSPRAY (incognito on screen as MACE) with music by band mate Peter Fogel and lyrics by the versatile star-fucker Soldier himself. The song also spawned raw material for much of the the soundtrack theme. PORN IS THE NEW BLACK had it's live performance debut recently when PEPPERSPRAY opened for Cher at San Francisco's Chronicle Pavilion. The band is a smash-hit live sensation and is currently developing material for a studio album. Here, quadruple-threat Soldier poses the musical question, 'Why is everybody shavin' their hootchie-coochie?' and commands you to 'Fuck what you're told!'

Celebrate the well-lubed Ups-n-Downs of life in the Industry with a theme song for the rest of us...
PORN IS THE NEW BLACK!"

via Fleshbot

Half an hour

I never had you, nor will I ever have you
I suppose. A few words, an approach
as in the bar yesterday, and nothing more.
It is, undeniably, a pity. But we who serve Art
sometimes with intensity of mind, and of course only
for a short while, we create pleasure
which almost seems real.
So in the bar the day before yesterday -- the merciful alcohol
was also helping much --
I had a perfectly erotic half-hour.
And it seems to me that you understood,
and stayed somewhat longer on purpose.
This was very necessary. Because
for all the imagination and the wizard alcohol,
I needed to see your lips as well,
I needed to have your body close.

Constantine P. Cavafy (1917)

I heart the west village

"Wait a minute, where am I? Just a moment ago, I was walking south on Hudson Street from Christopher, past the John Melser Charrette School (a k a P. S. 3), took a left on Grove -- or was it Marloes Road in London (the sudden Englishness of the hidden mews at Grove Court has regyroscoped my geographical inner ear) -- and I've run smack into a Federal wood house from early 19th-century America on the corner, No. 100 Bedford Street. Beside it, at 102, is a stucco Tudor worthy of note, at least for its eccentricity, and now I'm turning around to see the back of the school on whose pediment has been carved ''Childhood Shows the Man.'' Must be America. But when I turn right and cross the street, it seems I've wound up in . . . the Ninth Arrondissement? Can't be. The street signs all along the boulevard say Bedford, but on this side of Seventh and that side of Carmine, I could almost swear I was in Paris.

Although our blessed city is loaded with charming and quirky streets, few have as many quirks per foot as Bedford Street in Greenwich Village. It parades for only eight blocks (and two of those are thumb-size) but is home to almost a dozen restaurants, two bars, a lounge featuring drag shows, a palm reader, two antique shops and an avant-garde exercise studio (Gyrotonic, a sort of rotating strength-o-ciser soon to replace both Pilates and yoga as Workout of the Hip). "
(...)
"So if you want a refreshing toe-dip into the global village (including our own), you don't have to join the army. Become a freelancer, walk south from Christopher on Bedford and see the world. All right, Greenland and Australia aren't represented, but they're not honest continents anyway. "
via NYTimes

best movie directors

Guardian chose the world's 40 best movie directors and the American Media is in uproar -- the concept of Cinema as Art has been erased from thinking heads all over.

Their opinion. They're entitled. This would never be a consensus topic anyway. The choices and reasons for the choices are interesting though...

museumofse[x] (i heart ny)

Watch the very funny ads for new york's museumofse[x] at AdAge.com

via gothamist

putting the 'ho' back in hotel, part ii

Email from my friend mr. ls, the aussie:

Yahoo! Mail: R U a fan of Paris?
Check out her fabulous film debut: The Paris Hilton Sex Tape

Now, EVERYBODY has seen it...
Thank you mr. ls.
BTW, do you know Australians use to be hot, according to Gawker until the Hilton Sisters visited your country? (The picture on the side is of when the Hilton Sisters were in Melbourne for the traditional Derby Day.)
For me they are still HOT - Australian accent still drives me C-R-A-Z-Y - just like that Jamie Lee Curtis character in A Fish Called Wanda got turned on by Italian (the language), even if the only words Kevin Kline knew were 'spaghetti', 'ravioli', 'lasagna'...

To call you stupid would be an insult to stupid people. I've known sheep that could outwit you. I've worn dresses with higher I.Qs.
Wanda (Jamie Lee Curtis) to Otto (Kevin Kline)

BUT I digress...

See you on the dance floor...

satisfaction ii

David Shapiro: Consumed

For two years David Shapiro has been saving every package, bag, bottle or jar that once contained his food or drink. He fills the space of the gallery to the brim with this bodega-sized collection of garbage.

CONSUMED
an installation of 2 years of boxes, bags, bottles, + cans.
curated by Larry Walczak

DATES: Oct 17th - Nov 16th, 2003
OPENING: Friday, Oct 17th, 7 - 9 p.m.
HOURS: Friday - Monday, 12 - 6 p.m. and by appointment
LOCATION: eyewash@ Jack The Pelican Gallery
487 Driggs Avenue
Brooklyn, NY 11211

we can get no satisfaction

When I'm drivin' in my car
and that man comes on the radio
and he's tellin' me more and more
about some useless information
supposed to fire my imagination.
I can't get no, oh no no no.
Hey hey hey, that's what I say.

I can't get no satisfaction,
I can't get no satisfaction.
'Cause I try and I try and I try and I try.
I can't get no, I can't get no.

Satisfaction - Rolling Stones

SATISFACTION Pronunciation: `satis'fakshun
 Definition:
[1]  act of fulfilling a desire or need or appetite
[2]  the contentment you feel when you have done something right
[3]  compensation for a wrong
[4]  state of being gratified; great satisfaction

Madonna was on Letterman the other night and was explaining why she does not let her children watch tv: she does not want them to see and internalize the impossible to achieve standards set by advertising and tv shows in general, which makes us a nation of unsatisfied shopping zombies (that last part is mine). We think that a Prada sandal or a Flat Screen Panel will make us happy. So we shop, if we have money. And we want. And search. For a guy that is 6.2, great body and big feet...
The keystone of Buddhism is dettachment - you will only achieve Nirvana if you let go your desire to accumulate, possess...
We consider ourselves intelligents but we are not able to see the impossible goals we have set up for ourselves: most of the times, wrong goals.
WHY do you think you want a boyfriend with a muscular body??? Why is it going to bring you satisfaction? IT WILL NOT. And that's why we go on searching for the next muscular guy.
Or iPod with higher storage capability.
Or cellphone that can take pictures.

WHAT BRINGS ME SATISFACTION?

WHAT KIND OF SATISFACTION? From the definition above, there are several levels of satisfaction - ranging from [1] a physical, basic level like hunger and shelter thru [4] which seems to come from feeling that you are or have accomplished something worth. Self-actualization?

Advertising's job is to creat NEED so we will be compelled to SPEND. It uses impossible/hard to achieve idealistic images.
GAY ADVERTISING IS THE WORST: the dictatorship of the body perfect, smooth and blond permeates our culture in such a manner that we find it hard to tell what really is that turn us (individually) on.

WHY DO HUGE BICEPS TURN YOU ON? I would like to understand. 'Just because' is not an explanation.

The missing question

07. How Much of the Body is Replaceable?

i heart ny

NY Times :
Where Diners Are in the Dark, but Waiters Can See

"Being in the dark about what you are eating is hardly unusual. Being in the dark while you are eating, however, is."

MATRIX CONVOLUTIONS: The mystery 'B'

When Trin Mr. DW and I finally escaped from The Matrix we thought we had arrived in Rome (or where we believed Rome used to be) but after crossing 'The Wall' we found ourselves in a totally unfamiliar parallel reality. The sign read 'B'. "With its glossy interior, all marble and mirrors, and its imposing gated entrance, the 'B' Room recalls one of those cartoon plutocrats who takes a wrong turn and gets his top hat knocked off by a Katzenjammer Kid."

We had clearly chosen the wrong door - jus as Neo had done in 'Reloaded'. We did not know what 'B' stood for and 'The Host' was not helpful - he rushed us out. We could see we did not belong.

BUT we needed answers to the questions the Matrix had just imposed on us. AND there we were back where we started, outside the door, lost again...

'B'iltmore Room
NYTimes gives it ***
290 Eighth Avenue (near 25th Street);
(212) 807-0111

imaginary craiglist

The fish is talking!
Yes, but, is he saying anything?

DESPERATELY ISO FRIENDS.

GWM, 41, ISO friends that:
will try to listen and hear
and
will not mind listening
as well as not mind hearing.
In exchange, I'll do the same.

PS: New Fox Reality Show: The fish is talking!

DISCONNECTED FROM CONNEXION

"Connexion is a social network with a twist. It not only allows you to meet new people and explore the connections among your friends, but it also allows you to be informed (in a non-obtrusive manner) about that most important of American institutions: Voting."

I was flattered that a good friend had invited me to join 'Connexion'' because he said it was where his closer friends were.

The first odd thing I noticed, though, was the claim that it was somehow linked to voting, the 'most important American Institution'. Since I do not vote nor am I American that should have been my clue.

The second odd thing was how close it resembles Friendster. Visually, they have only changed the colors. My friend dismisses my point by saying that this is ''the American Way''. I have to remember to use this excuse (except I'm not American).

He also goes on to justify that Connexion was created by a Gay Man and it's not so exploited as Friendster.

Alright.

That makes me take a closer look around. And I ask:

Why is this less exploitative than Friendster?
and most importantly
Where are the Gay minorities? It looks like 'Find a Rich White Boyfriend' Club (I know lots of you want to join now).

My friend again:
It's less exploitative because it's only FOUR degrees of connections to Friendster SIX (hummm?), therefore you have more control over your network (hummm?).

And, to prove his point, disconnects me without giving me a chance.

NOW, THAT'S THE AMERICAN WAY!

BTW, the twist they claim differentiates them - voting - I could not see any reference to it anywhere.

The site is JUST LIKE FAKESTER, but more hypochritical because they think they are even more exclusive - and therefore better than YOU and I - because they are hiding behind that American Institution (on top of the same phony profile you created on Friendster by listing the books and movies YOU IMAGINE the person YOU WANT TO MEET might be drawn to).

PS to my Friendster: I am venting about this site - NOT about you. I am still flattered (and hurt by the dismissal) that you wanted me in.

san diego on fire

via MemeFirst

The 'Q' word

365Gay.com: New York Bans Queers
The state of New York has banned Queers. Not the people. Just the name. And that has one queer man heading to the state's Supreme Court.

Let Me Get This Straight...: "New York state has banned the use of the Q word. You know, that word starting with a 'qu,' a pair of 'e's' and a 'r.' Christopher Barton Benecke, a Manhattan paralegal, attempted to license his non profit advocacy business as 'Queer Awareness.' Section 301 of state Not-for-Profit Corporation Law prohibits the word in a business name, so his application was rejected. He's vowed to fight the ruling all the way to the state supreme court."

gay artporn

Fleshbot is a new weblog that showcases digital porn found over the internet. "This includes CGI and morphed images, amateur girls, webcam guys, sex blogs, hentai and yaoi, accidental smut, vintage erotica, celebrity candids, and streaming hardcore video.''
BTW, there's a straight and a gay version of it.

Some interesting links:
Hello There
Gay 3D Art Galleries

Mom Finds Out About Blog

Widmar said he imagines his inbox filling up with e-mails containing elaborate questions about an off-hand comment on Kill Bill—or, should he appear to have too much free time, requests for him to come and visit her. "The clock is ticking, I've gotta act fast. At this very minute, she might be reading about the time I did Ecstasy last summer. If Mom finds that entry, I can pretty much count on our conversations for the next year being centered on the dangers of drug use."
via The Onion

secret santa

'Created' by plasticbag, the idea of Secret Santa is very simple - this is Santa's third year, and in the last two years over 1,000 presents were sent out to people, promoting peace love and general loveliness all over the world - from Japan to Germany!

Metaphysical (and rhetorical) question

BELLY WORSHIPPING:

Fleshbot: "We hear beer bellies are coming back."

A 'Belly Worship' Web Site

Re-reading | The Guardian | Is the potbelly the new gay ideal?

New light on what the butler saw

The Evening Standard

Jules Verne would be proud

As seen in sci-fi movies...

IO2 Technology Revolutionary Interactive Heliospace Free-Space Display
"The Heliodisplay projects full color streaming video into free space (i.e. air). It is plug-and-play compatible with most video sources (TV, DVD, computer, etc.). These non-holographic images can be fully interactive, allowing a hand or finger to select, navigate and manipulate %u2014 as if it were a virtual touch screen."
Via J-Walk Blog

The Prada's on the other foot

Bravo TV announced plans for "Straight Eye for the Queer Guy"

Gays are starting to bitch. In Brazil, there is a saying: 'Pepper in someone else's eyes is refreshment' (do you have the same here? Does it translate well?).
My point is: get over it! 'Queer Eye' is a bad show that reinforces bad steriotypes. But if you do not think so, you have no right to complain about 'Straight Eye'.
Equal rights DO NOT mean special rights.

Let Me Get This Straight jokes: "Frankly, we could use a good lesson on sports and power tools. If Queer Eye can play up stereotypes, we're looking forward to our hetero brothers teaching us a thing or two."

But plasticbag is offended - and reasonably defends his point:
"Some of my gay colleagues are protesting that turning the tables back again isn't really acceptable behaviour... Their argument is that gay people already know enough about straight life - given that they've had to spend many years trying to fit into straight culture while being taught that their lives will be immoral, diseased and short-lived before erupting free from this stigma in a blaze of brightly-coloured taffeta and nicely-tapered trouser-bottoms. Their point is - I suppose - that one's a tasteless misrepresentation, and the other isn't..."
He has very good points and you should read his entire post.

Hanging Garden of Babble-On

It would be amazing - and so uniquely New York (and Paris, I guess) - if a park comes true and the High Line is preserved.


Gothamist asks: What's Up With West Chelsea?
"The continuing gentrification of the formerly gritty neighborhood into "A DESTINATION" is bolstered by the future Frank Gehry designed headquarters for Barry Diller."

I'll keep dreaming of the High Line as a... swimming pool?

Many Proposals for Rusty Rail Line on the West Side: "Ernesto Mark Faunlagui of Hoboken won for his proposal to alter the viaduct through incisions and displacement, creating new openings, parapets, walls and skylight wells. And Matthew Greer of New York won for his plan to let the structure continue to evolve naturally into a kind of wild meadow.

A separate award for public access was won by Takuji Nakamura of Tokyo, who proposed illuminated shafts penetrating the viaduct, with stairs and elevators.

Other entries recreated the High Line as a farm, a fluorescent fun house, a log-flume ride, a trellis-wrapped garden, a roller coaster, a small-scale Appalachian Trail and the zones of Dante's paradise, purgatory and inferno."
NYTimes 6/1/03

Also,
Friends of the High Line
Pictures of the High Line
Promenade Plantée Paris 12ème - France
More photos of The High Line

sorta a response to Lou Reed...

are you taking the high-brow white glove highway on me?

anyone lived in a pretty how town
e.e.cummings

Women and men (both dong and ding)
summer autumn winter spring
reaped their sowing and went their came
sun moon stars rain

favorite songs, great poetry and i heart ny combined into one post

Walk On The Wild Side
Lou Reed
Transformer (1972)

Holly came from Miami, Fla
Hitchhiked her way across the USA.
Plucked her eyebrows on the way
Shaved her leg and then he was she - she said:

Hey Babe, take a walk on the wild side,
Said hey honey, take a walk on the wild side.

Candy came from out on the island,
In the backroom she was everybodys darling,
But she never lost her head
Even when she was given head - she said

Hey Babe, take a walk on the wild side,
Said hey honey, take a walk on the wild side.
And the coloured girls go, doo dodoo

Little Joe never once gave it away,
Ev'rybody had to pay and pay.
A hustle here and a hustle there
New York city is no place where they said:

Hey Babe, take a walk on the wild side,
Said hey honey, take a walk on the wild side.

Sugar plum fairy came and hit the streets
Looking for soul food and a place to eat
Went to the Apollo, you should have seen him go go go - they said:

Hey Sugar, take a walk on the wild side,
Said hey honey, take a walk on the wild side.

Jackie is just speeding away,
Thought she was James Dean for a day
Then I guess she had to crash, Valium would have helped that bash - she said:

Hey Sugar, take a walk on the wild side,
Said hey honey, take a walk on the wild side.
And the coloured girls go, doo dodoo "

Peek-a-Blog

"The weblog (or blog) is the modern-day secular version of confession, broadcast to the masses. Written in free-form style, blogs are as prevalent on the Web as ads for penile enhancement. Blogging is hip; celebrities do it (moby.com/cms/viewalldiary.asp), athletes do it (kournikova.com), and politicians do it (deanforamerica.com). So do civilians like Soulless (blackasmysoul.typepad.com), Chickpea 981 (chickpea981.diaryland.com), and "Chubby Momma" Connie (chubby-momma.com).

Blogs are the unpolished DIY zines of the online world, cut 'n' paste creations of journal entries, essays, poems, photos, and artwork. Like the rest of the Internet, lots of blogs have something to do with sex. Tell-all accounts of flirting and foreplay, graphic musings on the art of the blowjob, randy tales of unsafe sex—blogs cover all the bases. You can frolic with a self-proclaimed Vanilla Sex Goddess (vanillasexgoddess.blogspot.com), check in on a single guy looking for sex (scurrility.blogspot.com), or get off on the Journals of a Pleasure Activist (livejournal.com/users/evalux)."
The Village Voice: Peek-a-Blog by Tristan Taormino

strange power of homosexuality

Some interesting ideas via The Village Voice

"I doubt that Charles will be murdered with a red-hot poker up his bum, as Edward II was for his same-sex inclinations. But unless the uproar dies down, he may be forced to defer to snow-white William rather than sully the international mystique of the British crown. Such is the strange power of homosexuality to subvert tradition and hierarchy. Keeping that threat at bay is the purpose of the closet.

The greatest lesson I ever had in queer theory was watching Liberace perform. It was the gayest show I'd ever seen, complete with a young protégé who accompanied him in a matching spangled getup. Yet when Liberace took his bow, the aisles were filled with swooning ladies. How can they possibly regard him as an object of adoration, I wondered? The answer lay in what he didn't say. As long as Lee's sexuality was unacknowledged, his fans could preserve their romantic fantasy no matter how campy he got. The unspoken maintains the illusion of normalcy. Liberace's closet didn't require credibility; only silence.

If you think the days of denying the evident are over, check out the Metropolitan Museum's exhibit on men in skirts. Though few dudes will wear this garment, designers keep producing it, decade after decade. Why this persistence in the absence of a market? The curators discuss everything from gender politics to subcultural strategies, but they don't offer the most logical explanation: Many male designers are gay. This is not an issue of outing, but of honoring the customary silence among couturiers. It's the rag-trade equivalent of "don't ask, don't tell."

Matrix, the end: you have to believe.

davextreme attempts to clarify the end of the movie and actually it makes sense to me.
Warning: if you haven't seen the movie this might spoil it.

So by the end of Revolutions we have Smith having corrupted the Matrix to a point where the machines can’t stop him. We have Neo, who in choosing the wrong door has broken the cycle necessary to reboot the Matrix, and then we have the two of them destroying each other and leaving the Architect with no idea what to do. Nothing like this has happened before, as shown by Sati bringing color to the sky of the Matrix for the first time ever. By saying that those still in the Matrix will be free, the Architect is pointing to the Christian promise that our bodies will be returned to us at the end of days. What bothers me is not this ending (which I think I like), but that it’s an ending which even the omniscient characters in the story don’t understand. They’re for the first time ever in a situation where the don’t know what’s going to happen, so it just doesn’t feel complete.

And, of course, it isn’t complete. The Matrix is still running in some fashion, and from the press material The Matrix Online will take us into that world. My guess is that it will finally be the battle to convince everyone to wake up, now that the machines don’t have utter control over the world. I’d guess also that The Merovingian and the other rogue programs may have an opportunity to gain a foothold in the anarchy.

Miss Afghanistan Wins Award at Miss Earth

AfghanNews.net - First in Afghan News Worldwide!: "The Miss Earth crown went Sunday to Miss Honduras Dania Prince. Brazil´s Pricila Zandona was selected first runner-up.

Miss Afghanistan Vida Samadzai, condemned in her homeland for parading in a bikini at the Miss Earth contest, failed to make the semifinals but won the pageant´s first "beauty for a cause" award on Sunday.

The 23-year-old Samadzai, the first Afghan in three decades to take part in a beauty contest, she was cited for "symbolizing the newfound confidence, courage and spirit of today´s women" and for "representing the victory of women´s rights and various social, personal and religious struggles." Samadzai could face prosecution if she returns to her native country, a senior Afghan justice official said Saturday.

Fazel Ahmad Manawi, deputy head of Afghanistan´s Supreme Court, told The Associated Press that Samadzai, a college student in California, had betrayed Afghan culture by appearing at the Miss Earth contest in a bikini - and may have also broken the law.

"I hope that this lady regrets her actions," Manawi said. He added that Afghan prosecutors may open an investigation, but refused to say what charges or penalties Samadzai could face."

PUTTING THE 'HO' BACK IN HOTEL

CAN'T WAIT for the tv show ''The Simple Life''... AND I know Paris Hilton is SO over. But I find it all amusing.

From the latest Abercrombie&Fitch Catalog (via Gothamist):
'Are you guys are on Friendster?'
Nicole: No.
Paris: No, but everyone keeps coming up and asking me that. Theyre'like, 'I saw you on Friendster.' And I'm like, 'What does that mean?' And they're like, 'Well, someone is pretending to be you.' I don't even know what it is. Everyone tell me I'm in it, and it's so weird. It's really embarrassing.
Nicole: I think it's over the internet. You go on and meet friends online.
Paris: Um - I'm really not that desperate.

And from Gawker:

"Okay, the ladylike Lloyd Grove obviously needs a hit from his smelling salts. In the Daily News today, he claims that Paris Hilton's answer to the question 'Did you have any other personal-hygiene dilemmas?' (while filming the reality TV show The Simple Life) is 'too graphic and embarrasing [sic] to reprint.'
(Oh God. I'm actually going to transcribe from Abercrombie & Fitch Quarterly. My high school journalism teacher is so proud right now. Here we go.)
Paris: No. The worst was when we went commercial fishing. We came back and we took all our clothes off, and I didn't think it smelled that bad because the scent sort of came with me, but then I walked out of the bathroom for a second and then I walked back in and -- oh my God, the smell... I think I threw up that day.
Nicole: It was so gross -- there were fish guts everywhere.
Paris: And there was a lot of blood all over my clothes."

NOW I HAVE SEEN THE MATRIX

Savoring my last chances to spend time with mr. dw.

And I loved it. As I had expected (and blogged yesterday). The movie. And of course the time spent as well. ''The end left us with more questions than answers, and frankly, we wouldn't have it any other way.''

Another quote from Black Table:

"The Matrix universe is such a momentous artistic achievement, functioning on so many levels, that the negative popular reaction to the last two installments of the series doesn't just sit poorly with us, it's positively infuriating."

and

"The architect tells the oracle, 'that was a dangerous little game you played.' Huh? Excuse me? What the hell does that mean? And wait, how does that little girl fit into this? What, exactly, happened to Neo and Agent Smith? Are there still humans stuck in The Matrix? If the war is over, can humans and machines really live in harmony? The end The Matrix: Revolutions leaves us with more questions than answers, and frankly, we wouldn't have it any other way."

twenty five questions

Via NYTimes
and I do not know what #7 is/was. Maybe because 12 is in fact 2 distinct questions. Or maybe the Science Section is just not good at Math...

01. Does Science Matter?
02. Is War Our Biological Destiny?
03. Will Humans Ever Visit Mars?
04. How Does the Brain Work?
05. What Is Gravity, Really?
06. Will We Ever Find Atlantis?
08. What Should We Eat?
09. When Will the Next Ice Age Begin?
10. What Happened Before the Big Bang?
11. Could We Live Forever?
12. Are Men Necessary? ...
... Are Women Necessary?
13. What Is the Next Plague?
14. Can Robots Become Conscious?
15. Why Do We Sleep?
16. Are Animals Smarter Than We Think?
17. Can Science Prove the Existence of God?
18. Is Evolution Truly Random?
19. How Did Life Begin?
20. Can Drugs Make Us Happier? Smarter?
21. Should We Improve Our Genome?
22. How Much Nature Is Enough?
23. What Is the Most Important Problem in Math Today?
24. Where Are Those Aliens?
25. Do Paranormal Phenomena Exist?

BESIEGEN DIE STIEFEL

"Now that Friendster has become little more than a sluggish vehicle for desperate booty calls, the real action on social networking websites has shifted over to Tribe.net, where the 'tribe' feature is allowing like-minded individuals to explore (sometimes overly-) specific sexual interests together." Via Fleshbot

"Tribe.net is a service where friends help friends do everything from finding a job to sharing their favorite restaurant.

Here are three things you can do RIGHT NOW with Tribe.net:
- Connect with people you know: family, school friends, co-workers
- Join and create "Tribes" around your interests
- Get a friend's recommendation for anything from a great restaurant to a gentle dentist"

and, it seems, find people that share your fetish, like...
SHOE WORSHIPING


NOT one of mine, btw.

Bishop's anti-gay comments spark legal investigation

"A bishop who angered homosexuals by suggesting they seek a psychiatric cure is to be investigated by police to see if his outspoken views amount to a criminal offence, it emerged yesterday."
Via Telegraph

"There can and must be legal equality for gay citizens. But there can and must also be space for those who dissent to have their say. "
Via Andrew Sullivan

i'm there with you.

"i am not the boy who cried wolf... i am the man who is lost in his own backyard... "

missing my mother

I lost my mother in november of a forgotten year.
Actually, i didn't loose her but was immediatelly lost without her.
The longings. Sudden conscious longings...

As usual someone else's words brought back convoluted memories...

"Mothers are like that. They leave suddenly, only to reappear in dreams and thoughts, in sudden conscious longings, in the long forgotten advice about car maintenance, in the shape of a hairdo, or the smell of forgotten soups.
Mothers try like that, not to be remebered, but to give and do: somehow their task is never finished, and their presence is always something to talk about.
Even in memories or dreams, mothers seem to be unwilling to let things be, or to leave a scrapped knee unatended: there is always a practical advice, their gaze yet attentive and watchful.
Mine has not appeared in dreams for a long time, couple of months at most. It is true that I haven't been sleeping, though.
Mothers in dreams, revisiting the world of unfinished projects, of tales that never got told, of stories that need to be shared."

via Mercurial